Movies like Joyland (2022)
The best movies like Joyland (2022) are The Quiet Girl (2022), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) and Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013). If Joyland hooked you with its romance and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedPortrait of a Lady on Fire (2019)8.1/10 from 3,102 votes
- NewestCactus Pears (2025)Released 2025
The Quiet Girl (2022)
A quiet, neglected girl is sent away from her dysfunctional family to live with relatives for the summer. She blossoms in their care, but in this house where there are meant to be no secrets, she discovers one.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPortrait of a Lady on Fire (2019)
On an isolated island in Brittany at the end of the eighteenth century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisBlue Is the Warmest Color (2013)
Adèle's life is changed when she meets Emma, a young woman with blue hair, who will allow her to discover desire, to assert herself as a woman and as an adult. In front of others, Adele grows, seeks herself, loses herself, finds herself.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCobalt Blue (2022)
When an aspiring author and his free-spirited sister both fall for the enigmatic paying guest at their home, ensuing events rock their traditional family.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Cactus Pears (2025)
Anand, a 30-something city dweller compelled to spend a 10-day mourning period for his father in the rugged countryside of western India, tenderly bonds with a local farmer who is struggling to stay unmarried. As the mourning ends, forcing his return, Anand must decide the fate of his relationship born under duress.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Birds of Paradise (2021)
Two dancers at an elite ballet academy in Paris must compete for a contract to join the highly coveted Opéra National de Paris as they confront their competitive nature, sexual awakenings and how far they would go to win.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFar from Heaven (2002)
In 1950s Connecticut, a housewife's life is upended by a marital crisis and mounting racial tensions in society.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisPhantom Thread (2017)
In 1950s London, a renowned dressmaker's meticulous lifestyle begins drastically changing as his relationship with his young muse intensifies.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDreams (2024)
Johanne falls in love with her teacher and records her fantasies and feelings in writing. Together with her mother and grandmother, they debate the literary potential and whether to publish it.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Immigrant (2013)
1921 New York. An immigrant woman is tricked into a life of burlesque and vaudeville until a dazzling magician tries to save her and reunite her with her sister who is being held in the confines of Ellis Island.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNational Theatre Live: Yerma (2017)
A woman is driven to the unthinkable by her desperate desire to have a child in Simon Stone’s radical production of Lorca’s achingly powerful masterpiece.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Lady Chatterley's Lover (2015)
An early-20th-century tale of love across class boundaries which tells the legendary and romantic story of Lady Chatterley’s affair with her gamekeeper. Jed Mercurio’s adaptation of DH Lawrence’s classic.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAll of Us Strangers (2023)
One night in his near-empty tower block in contemporary London, Adam has a chance encounter with a mysterious neighbor, which punctures the rhythm of his everyday life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWaves (2019)
A controlling father’s attempts to ensure that his two children succeed in high school backfire after his son experiences a career-ending sports injury. Their familial bonds are eventually placed under severe strain by an unexpected tragedy.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisJulieta (2016)
The film spans 30 years in Julieta’s life from a nostalgic 1985 where everything seems hopeful, to 2015 where her life appears to be beyond repair and she is on the verge of madness.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFingernails (2023)
Anna and Ryan have found true love together. It's been proven by a controversial test. There's just one problem: Anna still isn't sure. Then she meets Amir.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisAtlantics (2019)
Arranged to marry a rich man, young Ada is crushed when her true love goes missing at sea during a migration attempt — until a miracle reunites them.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAmmonite (2020)
In 1840s England, palaeontologist Mary Anning and a young woman sent by her husband to convalesce by the sea develop an intense relationship. Despite the chasm between their social spheres and personalities, Mary and Charlotte discover they can each offer what the other has been searching for: the realisation that they are not alone. It is the beginning of a passionate and all-consuming love affair that will defy all social bounds and alter the course of both lives irrevocably.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOn the Rocks (2020)
Faced with sudden doubts about her marriage, a young New York mother teams up with her larger-than-life playboy father to tail her husband.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Five Devils (2022)
8-year-old Vicky has a mysterious gift: she can recreate any scent she comes across, even that of her beloved mother Joanne. When her estranged aunt Julia suddenly returns to town, the invocation of her fragrance plunges the young girl back in time to unravel a past replete with family secrets.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Souvenir (2019)
A shy but ambitious film student falls into an intense, emotionally fraught relationship with a charismatic but untrustworthy older man.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Lawyer (2020)
Marius is a highly successful lawyer based in Vilnius. He becomes obsessed with Ali, a handsome Syrian refugee he first encounters in an online chatroom run out of Belgrade. Marius is rich and enjoys a vibrant social and cultural life. Nevertheless, he feels that something is missing from it. The journey from Lithuania to Serbia is a relatively short one, but can the two navigate their way through the gulf that separates their very different lives? And how do they deal with the precarious obstacles of the physical borders that stand between them? Written and directed by Romas Zabarauskas, The Lawyer questions assumptions about what it means to be an immigrant and the possibilities offered by life in contemporary Europe.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
The Fits (2016)
While training at the gym, 11-year-old tomboy Toni becomes entranced with a dance troupe. As she struggles to fit in, she finds herself caught up in danger as the group begins to suffer from fainting spells and other violent fits.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisLight Light Light (2023)
Mariia visits her childhood home and reminisces about the summer of 1986, when a girl named Mimi arrived in the small village and filled the life of the then 15-year-old Mariia with light.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Falcon Lake (2022)
A shy teenager on a summer vacation experiences the joy and pain of young adulthood when he forges an unlikely bond with an older girl.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe American (2023)
American ballet dancer Joy Womack is accepted into Moscow's infamously tough Bolshoi Ballet Academy, with the dream of becoming a great ballerina.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisOnly You (2019)
A madly-in-love young couple's relationship begins to suffer when they struggle to conceive a child.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & romance
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTrue Things (2022)
A young woman living on the fringes of society becomes intoxicated by a stranger who overwhelms her quiet life.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisOf an Age (2023)
A Serbian ballroom dancer experiences an unexpected and intense 24-hour romance with a friend's older brother.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both romance & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlue Valentine (2010)
Dean and Cindy live a quiet life in a modest neighborhood. They appear to have the world at their feet at the outset of the relationship. However, his lack of ambition and her retreat into self-absorption cause potentially irreversible cracks in their marriage.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & romance
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Joyland?
The closest matches to Joyland are The Quiet Girl (2022), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) and Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Joyland?
People who watched Joyland most often go on to The Quiet Girl (2022), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) and Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013).
What is the highest-rated movie like Joyland?
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), rated 8.1/10 by 3,102 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Joyland?
Cactus Pears (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to Joyland chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Joyland, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.